from 2001

I was tired of the same old everyday, day to day, repeat junk. Tired of staring out and seeing what I saw all the time. Same black and glistening streets. Same Lexi and Volkswagens and Explorers intrepidly crowding me. I was tired of looking up, waiting for buildings to crash onto me, of drinking and drinking and being taken along, pretending not to be bothered. I was drinking the metally water from its protected source. Placid and cool, but not refreshing. I was smoking and each puff wore me down, made me think of more, of the next one to buy--of my struggle to consume and desire and need and need and not just let be and be. I had it all worked out of me. Whatever spark to fire the flame of fury or feeling or fortitude or risk. No dangling. Not vulnerable.

I used to skateboard. I was fearless, until I hurt myself. I used to snowboard. I was fearless, until I hurt myself. I used to believe.

My name is Random Spillwater. I'm a bastard of a bastard; the child of a motherless son. I'm a fatherless one. Mom was a telemarketer. She had a thing with her supervisor, Chuck. I don't like to think too much about Chuck and his white kingdom of cubicles, plastic and wires. Leering at the girls in headsets sitting in front of green-flickering computers. Leering at mom like a plague rat.

I spent my childhood playing video games, watching TV, and eating macaroni and cheese. No baseball, no soccer, no kites, no frisbee, no fishing. Children didn't talk to me and I didn't talk to them, but I had fantasies. Dervishes and diversions. I didn't hit the game-winning home run or kiss the girl (still waiting), but I talked to everyone. I said the right thing--to make people laugh, to raise the spirits of the sick, to excite the jealousy of those less well endowed. These were the dreams of Random the Orator. Hear him expostulate on subjects great and small. A meager grain of rice becomes a bumper crop of repartee.

The universe itself dissected, didacted, and resolved in the hollow of my mouth. I sing the stars to sleep and Oh, if someone had listened.

What a way to live. In silence always jabbering a commentary, every moment, every moment running on without break. Now the outside crushes in instead of the inside straining out. I had creases at 20, and my hair was shocked with white at 25. I lost the last believer yesterday. Everyone loses today.

Look at me, the small, angry man. I am everywhere; a cliche. Powerless of my own volition. Without belief in volition. Another whiner. Yet another dissatisfied, internally choked and knotted, socially backward log in the jam in the ol' river o life.

Love What You Do

Conventional wisdom holds that if you love what you do, work will never feel like work. I don't know about that: every job is bound to include responsibilities that feel monotonous or burdensome.

Nevertheless, so far so good with my new job. Often several hours pass without me checking the time. The work is challenging and worthwhile. While I've had acting jobs I loved, I've never had a job like this before: great work, great social benefit, great pay.